For Maddy life was full of surprises. She had gone from under-aged and homeless on the streets of a foreign city, to fiancé of one of the most important men in the British government, to culinary student and single mother in Manchester. You'd think that she'd be used to surprises by now, but finding the message from Sherlock on her phone threw her for a loop even though in some sense she had been expecting it.
Sherlock Holmes was reactivating the homeless network. What did it mean for her now that she was no longer homeless?
In one sense, you could say that she was homeless in London, for although John Watson had most graciously let her and her infant child, Eliza, stay over for the winter holidays, her flat was far away in Manchester. She read the message again.
[Yellowsubmarine. Network reactivation. Contact me at once.]
It was dated December 30. She ran through the other messages rapidly and then texted the reactivation code that they had agreed on.
[YOKO]
The reply was rapid.
[Where are you? 0]
[At 221B visiting John like you told me. Are you still in Manchester?]
[Do not discuss locations on insecure lines. 0]
[are you coming back? Should I tell John?]
[No, under no circumstances tell John. And delete these messages after reading. 0]
[why?]
[You are being watched.]
"Of course we're being watched!" Maddy thought. Mycroft had probably assigned a team to watch her on the cctv cameras, that wasn't even counting her own spy Shawn who she had hired to watch John before Eliza's accident. Did he mean that there was a third group watching them? She wondered if they would trip over each other each trying to get the best view.
[You are being an ass. You should tell John.]
Long pause.
[Meet me tonight where we talked last. Same time as the last meeting. 0]
Maddy walked over and sat on the bed. Midnight. They had last met at midnight. Sherlock had led her to an attic where they had talked of John, and slept. He had left the county the next day under a false passport on a mission to hunt down all of the members of Moriarty's network in order to protect John and the other people that he loved.
She had promised to watch over John, although at the time she'd had only twenty pounds to her name, and no permanent abode. An impossible task, but somehow, she had been unable to ignore it. Even now, the one thing that kept her from chucking the phone and taking a bus back to Manchester with her baby, was a sinking concern that John was not taking Sherlock's loss well.
That night with the gun. He had said that holding a gun made him feel more secure. Well it made her feel really scared that he'd be thinking that his head might make a good target. What a tragedy it would be if Sherlock Holmes finally returned to his flat to find that the friend he had worked so hard to save was dead out of grief for him. Okay, it wasn't really that likely, but the fact that it was possible froze her blood every time she stood on the doorstep and tried to leave.
Sherlock had asked the impossible then. He asked the impossible now. How was she supposed to sneak out of here to meet him at midnight. She had a baby. She would have to get a sitter. What was she supposed to say? "Mrs Hudson please watch the baby tonight while I go to secretly meet Sherlock."
Besides, as he said, they were being watched. She knew that Mycroft's people would be watching. They might even be tailing her, and she was no cloak and dagger person. She certainly couldn't evade them while carrying Eliza. Before, when she was truly homeless, she didn't have such problems. She was invisible. Maybe she could be invisible again.
Maddy pulled out her phone and called her friend Abby who ran the homeless shelter.
"Maddy!" she said, "I got a call from that woman, Mrs. Holmes, and she's going to help us do fundraising. She said that you put her up to it. You've got to come by and let me thank you properly. I've got tea and biscuits."
"Oh Abby, don't worry about it...but now that you mention it, I think that I will come by tonight. Will you be there at ten o clock?"
"Of course, where else do I go? It's not as if I have a life outside of the shelter." Abby said laughing nervously, "See you soon."
"I'll be there." Maddy said closing the connection. She read over the messages on her phone one more time before deleting each one. Then she heard the sound of the outer door opening and John's heavy footsteps on the stairs. She left the room and walked downstairs. She found him in the kitchen putting a carton of milk in the fridge.
"So Maddy, are you off tomorrow for Manchester?"
"That's what I came to talk to you about," Maddy said, "My friend Abby who runs the homeless shelter where I used to live, she has a bit of an emergency and needs me to stay overnight. I was wondering if I can stay here a bit longer."
"Stay as long as you like Maddy," John said, "The room is empty, and you are a remarkably easy house guest. You even make me cupcakes."
"But the baby..."
"Is not half as annoying as Sherlock was on his violin. Maddy...really, it's fine."
"Thank you, John. You are certainly a gentleman. Namaste." She clapped her hands together and bowed.
"What's all that?" John asked.
"Just something we used to do back home. I'm just very grateful."
John smiled and turned back to put on the kettle.
Maddy went downstairs and told Mrs. Hudson who was more than happy to take Eliza overnight, then she went upstairs and pulled out her breast pump. She didn't know how many late nights there would be now that Sherlock was back.
In the dark of evening, a figure in a brown hoody walked out of the back door of the homeless shelter headed for the river. Maddy had enjoyed a nice cup of tea and biscuits with Abby who seemed much more optimistic than she had at their last meeting. She had told her that she wanted a bit of a walk around for old times sake, and asked to borrow some clothes. Abby had narrowed her eyes at that, no one felt nostalgic about starving on the street, but she was a good friend so she had helped her sneak out, and she would give her a solid alibi if anyone called. Old runaways have got to watch out for each other afterall.
Maddy stuck to the shadows. She climbed under the bridge and waited see if she was being followed. In the end, she concluded that she had slipped any pursuit and she took a careful route to the apartment building where she had last seen Sherlock.
She walked through the door, and then waited behind it for five minutes as they had done the last time, arriving in the closet a few minutes past the hour. She climbed the ladder into the attic, the hum of the fans loud in her ears as her eyes adjusted to the dark room lit only by the city lights which spilled in through louvered window openings.
A man stepped out silhouetted by the light. They stared at each other,
"Sherlock?" she asked unsure.
The man walked forward, the glow from the room below casting light on his black curls and his short goatee, "Maddy, we meet again," Sherlock Holmes said.
